Showing posts with label 1950s. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 1950s. Show all posts

Friday, February 23, 2024

Friday Fun THIS MAGAZINE IS CRAZY "Fact Realism vs TV is 'em Real"

Old West humor, illustrated by the legendary Jack Davis...
...but NOT from MAD!
It's from Charlton's This Magazine is CRAZY! V4N8, a MAD imitator which lasted only seven issues!
Both as a color comic and a b/w magazine, MAD inspired many imitators.
Some, like Cracked, are going even today (albeit on-line, not in print).
Others, like This Magazine is CRAZY, were short-lived, but able, from time to time, to get work from MAD's regular contributors, almost all of whom were freelancers.
This particular piece from 1959 apparently was a satirical response to TV's sanitizing the images of both cowboys and Indians in ongoing series.
Westerns were the most popular scripted genre at the time, dominating almost half of both the prime time and syndicated schedules.
The writer is, regrettably, unknown but it could be Davis himself, who utilized this format in both issues of his own short-lived color comic humor anthology Yak Yak, as seen HERE and HERE!
The writer is, regrettably, unknown.
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Monday, February 19, 2024

Monday Holiday Madness PRESIDENTS' DAY...the Holiday that Combines TWO Presidents' Birthdays!

Before they combined Lincoln's and Washington's birthdays into a "floating" holiday...
...Washington's Birthday was always celebrated each year on Feb 22nd...
...and Lincoln's Birthday was always on February 12th!
Why the change?
USA Today has an explanation HERE!
Since this is a comics blog, let's get back on-topic!
These two features appeared in a 1956 comic called "Every Day's a Holly Day"
(No, it's not a typo...as you can see!)
Why was it called that instead of "Every Day's a Holiday"?
Because it was given away to kids by grocers who sold Holly Sugar!
Illustrated by John Rosenberger, it's a unique pamphlet covering a number of American holidays, including Mothers' Day (though not Fathers' Day), Flag Day, Independence Day, Labor Day, Thanksgiving, and a couple of holidays we've largely abandoned...Pan-American Day and American Indian Day!
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Saturday, February 17, 2024

Space...Hero?...Saturdays STRANGE JOURNEY "Captain Kiddeo Space Bum"

Is it humor?
Is it serious?
I can't decide...
...read the tale and judge for yourself!
The title is a variation of "Captain Video", a tv show which had been cancelled three years earlier when this never-reprinted tale appeared in Ajax-Farrell's Strange Journey #3 (1958).
Yet the story itself has nothing to do with Captain Video, not even as a spoof of it, like MAD's superb Captain Tvideo which you can read HERE!
The attempts at humor and wit are lacking in both, and the illustrations have none of the wonderful background detail (Called "chicken fat" by artist Will ElderMAD's artists were famous for!
Plus, the art is so jammed-up, I have the impression the original (perhaps unpublished) story was longer, and re-edited to fit into the 5 page slot in an otherwise average sci-fi anthology.
We do know it's a product of the S M Iger Studio which packaged Ajax-Farrell's books, but not who the particular creatives were...
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Saturday, February 10, 2024

Space Hero Saturdays COMMANDER BATTLE AND THE ATOMIC SUB "Death of the H-Bomb!"

When an atomic bomb launched from the Moon hits Earth, the Atomic Sub is hastily-converted to an atomic spaceship.
The Atomic Commandos journey to the Moon, where they discover a race of humanoids angry at Earthmen since other Earthmen (specifically Russians) built an atomic missile base there, killing curious lunar inhabitants who tried to communicate with them!
Sentenced to death by the leader of the Moon Men, the unarmed Commandos face a huge lizard, while the sub is about to be destroyed by atomic plasma fire!
However, aboard the sub is a young "Become a Junior Atomic Commando Contest" winner...who's developed a telepathic transmitter/receiver!
Whatta guy!
So now the kid's a full-time member of the Atomic Commandos.
Has anybody told his parents???
This never-reprinted tale from ACG's Commander Battle and the Atomic Sub #3 (1954) was produced by series creators Richard Hughes (writer) and Sheldon Moldoff (illustrator).
A minor plot point: Submarines are designed to keep intense exterior water pressure from crushing them.
Spacecraft are designed to keep pressurized atmosphere from escaping outward into the vacuum of space.
Since their structures perform totally-different functions, they would be all but useless outside of the environments they were specifically-built to withstand!
Yeah, I know these stories were written for 8 to 14 year-olds, but still, that's no reason to be scientifically-illiterate!
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Thursday, February 8, 2024

Reading Room OUT OF THIS WORLD "Conquered Earth"

Ever wonder if Steve Ditko could do Jack Kirby-style epic star-spanning storytelling?
Well, wonder no more, True Believer!
Illustrated by Ditko, written, most likely, by Joe Gill, this tale was tucked in the back of Charlton's Out of This World #4 (1957), which featured three Ditko-rendered stories out of four tales!
Ah, those were the days...
When the story was reprinted in Charlton's Space War #31 (1978), it was finally cover-featured, with the cover for a different (and still never-reprinted) Ditko-illustrated tale...
...which we re-presented a couple of days ago, as shown HERE!
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Saturday, February 3, 2024

Space Hero Saturdays COMMANDER BATTLE AND THE ATOMIC SUB "Journey to the Moon with the Atomic Commandos!"

If you thought spaceships with propellers were weird...

...what do you think of traveling to the Moon...using an atomic submarine to get there!
(Yep, you read that right!)

Be Here
NEXT SATURDAY
for the astounding conclusion...
I'm surprised Irwin Allen never did a Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea episode like this!
Making a submarine into a spaceship seems like the sort of thing he would've loved to do.
(Adding a kid sidekick, though, is never a good idea.
They end up taking over the spotlight, and the series' emphasis goes from soft sci-fi to kid-show.)
Note: the 1990s TV series SeaQuest DSV did have it's sub go into outer space...transported by pacifist aliens to their homeworld to fight a war for them!
This never-reprinted tale from ACG's Commander Battle and the Atomic Sub #3 (1954) was produced by series creators Richard Hughes (writer and editor) and Sheldon Moldoff (illustrator).
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Tuesday, January 30, 2024

Reading Room VENUS COMICS "Little Man Who Wasn't There!"

What is "real" and what is "fiction"?
That's the basis for this story which would have qualified as "metafictional"...if the word had existed in 1951!
The writer for this never-reprinted story from Atlas' Venus Comics #14 (1951) is unknown.
Pity, since it's a clever little tale...though it would've benefited from being given a couple of additional pages to flesh out why the "creator" decided to suddenly alter the character's personality and actions so radically.
Perhaps the "creator"  in the last panel (artist John Tartaglione) was, himself, being manipulated by a creator who was going insane...
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